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From the London Guardian:

If you wanted to design an experiment to measure the effect on humans of almost inconceivably radical culture shock, you could not do much better than the one that has just begun to unfold with the arrival, deep in the American heartland, of the Somali Bantu. They are often referred to as one of the most isolated peoples on earth, and they are certainly one of the least westernised. Descended from slaves brought to Somalia from Mozambique and Tanzania, they worked in serfdom for decades before being forced to flee during the Somalian civil war. Mozambique and Tanzania refused to take them in, and for the past few years they have eked out an existence in Kenyan refugee camps. But now, in one of the largest transplantations of its type in recent history, most of the 12,000 Bantu tribespeople in Kenya are moving to the suburbs of the US, which granted them asylum in the late 90s. The Mberwa family—including Hassan's mother, Khadija, his wife Nurto, and six of their eight children, aged between two and 16—are the very first pioneers in the American west, only this time with freeways and Whataburgers. Full story

There is a mood of unreality in Los Angeles at the moment. Normally, at this time of the year everyone would be watching the National Basketball Association play-offs on television and seeing the local team, the LA Lakers, win the championship and then enjoying a downtown lap of honour in front of the mayor and tens of thousands of cheering citizenry. … But this year, for some bizarre reason, the Lakers are not in the finals. … The sports bars which should be crowded with Lakers' fans in purple and gold regalia are strangely silent. The buses don't carry their "Go Lakers" slogan on their destination boards and there are no Lakers flags attached to the SUVs rolling down the 405 and the 101. … For now, LA's greatest sporting moments have either become part of a musical or named after a cartoon character. Full story

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Speaking of the media, Robert Samuelson of the Washington Post makes a good point in a column I mostly disagreed with. Rather than overhauling their journalism curriculum, as Columbia University is doing, why don't colleges worry about producing good readers and viewers as well as reporters? "Presumably, one task of college is to engage students in the big ideas and events of their time," Samuelson wrote. "On the evidence, that's not happening. Why—and what should colleges do about it?"

With an eye to the crucial link colleges and universities forge between ideas and society, this occasional category of the weblog will round up stories about higher education. This week, all are from the Chronicle of Higher Education unless noted otherwise.

• Whether to write about their research, reach a non-academic audience, or just get some things off their chests, scholars have taken to weblogs. Although law professor Glenn Reynolds' InstaPundit remains the most popular by far, a host of other academics are blogging. The question remains, says the Chronicle: "Is this a revolution in academic discourse, or is it CB radio?"
• For African American women—historically among the most marginalized members of society—few benchmarks could be as satisfying, it seems, as permeating the ranks of the intellectual elite. But a Ph.D. can lead to isolation and even resentment of females in African American culture, writes Trudier Harris, an English professor at the University of North Carolina, in a memoir excerpted in the Chronicle.

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